This party is boring as hell, but I didn’t come here to socialize. I came here for my three favorite things: oxy, weed, and speed. Oxy to kill the pain, weed to chill me out, and speed to wake my ass up.

I wouldn’t mind a side of coke and a blow job to top it off, but neither one of those seem to be options for me tonight, judging from this crowd.

My old high school friend Jimmy invites me to all his college parties, even though I haven’t had any sort of academic goals or socialized with friends since I was pushed into a bonfire three years ago and came out looking like a side of beef jerky.

By the time I had gone through countless burn treatments, skin grafts, and other horrific shit I’d rather not think about, school was no longer a priority for me. My chance of getting an athletic scholarship was gone. Most of my so-called friends had gone MIA, one of them taking my girlfriend with him.

Good riddance, assholes and bitches.

Friends were overrated anyway, once morphine became the love of my life.

Pre-fire, I worked out five days a week and ran every morning. I ate lean and clean. I meditated and did yoga. I had a few beers and got stoned maybe once or twice a month with friends to unwind. My body and my mind were my ticket to everything I wanted in my future: athletic success, inspiring others, and an equally beautiful and healthy partner to share life with.

At sixteen, I had a clearly defined path mapped out for myself, and I wasn’t going to let anything get in my way. I had watched my father struggle to pay bills and work his ass off seven days a week at the motorcycle shop he’d owned for twenty years. Pop had a lot of biker friends, and if they needed something, he was there. That included fixing their bikes for free because that’s what bikers do. It’s one big family. That shit didn’t pay the bills, though, and I refused to follow in his footsteps. I’d let my brothers do that. Me? I was getting out of this town, population of twelve hundred.

Raising the bottle of whiskey to my lips, I welcome the burn as it seeps down my chest and into my gut recalling, with equal bitterness, how I left the hospital with a flicker of hope and a handful of prescriptions. Hope soon took a backseat to an addiction that had crept up on me slowly, obliterating my plans.

My physical scars were easy to see, splayed out across my flesh for people to stare at, back away from, and question endlessly. The scars on the inside, though, managed to go unnoticed as they snaked through me like a poison.

A tall, lanky kid approaches me where I’m perched on a fence post thirty feet away from the crowd of college kids drinking, dancing, and making out. He wouldn’t be coming over here in the dark unless he had good reason, so I know he’s the one I’ve been waiting for.

“You Ty?” he asks nervously, his eyes scanning the area like he expects the police to jump out of the shadows.

“Well, I ain’t Mickey Mouse.”

He pushes his silver-rimmed glasses up his nose. “Jimmy sent me to hook you up.”

I take a pull off my drink. “Yay for Jimmy,” I say sarcastically. “Whaddya got, Waldo?”

He reaches into his jacket pocket and produces a clear plastic bag filled with weed, pills, and a small vial of coke.

“How much?”

“Eight hundred.”

Without much regret, I pull out a wad of cash. Some worked for, some stolen. “Guess I won’t be eating for a while,” I say, handing almost all of it over to him.

He double checks my count. “Or you could just not do drugs.”

Laughing, I snatch the bag from him and cram it down the front of my jeans. “Not exactly good advice coming from a dealer. Don’t they teach you marketing in college?”

“I only sell it. I don’t do it.”

I jump off the fence and give him a friendly smack on the back. “Do yourself a favor and don’t do either.”

Too tired to find a girl drunk enough to go down on me, I ditch the party and head for my car, parked on a dark, dead-end street. On my way, I spot a lone girl leaning against a car in front of Jimmy’s house, her face in her hands, crying. As I get closer, I realize it’s Wendy.

Lighting up a cigarette, I saunter over to her. “Whatsa matter, Wendy? Karma biting your ass?” I slur.

“Fuck off, Tyler,” she lashes out, wiping away the snot that’s running from her nose. Three years ago, I thought she was one of the prettiest girls in school. Somewhere along the line she lost her glow, and a dull version of my first crush stands sniveling in her place.

Cradling her chin in my palm, I lift her face toward the streetlight to see the purple and blue discoloration on her cheek and the beginnings of a black eye.

“Don’t touch me.” She jerks her face out of my hand and looks down at the ground between us. “Get away from me.”

“You still can’t look at me, can you Wendy?” I ask, leaning closer to her, my body inches from hers. “Do I make you that sick?”

She lifts her head, and her cold gaze flits from my eyes to the mottled flesh that runs across half my forehead and down the side of my face. Gulping, she closes her eyes and turns her head away.

“You’re drunk and probably high, Ty. That makes me sick.”

“Then look at me.” I rest one hand on the car door next to her. “Look at me like you used to.”

Still looking away, she tries to melt into the car door in an effort to put more distance between us. “I can’t, okay?” She says defiantly. “It skeeves me out. Are you happy now?”

I take a long drag off my cigarette and blow the smoke in her face. “Yeah, Wendy, I am. ’Cuz it looks like you’re getting exactly what you fucking deserve.”

I leave her standing there, wondering what kind of future she thinks she’s going to have when, at nineteen years old, she’s decided that a good-looking guy who hits her is more appealing than one who’s scarred up but treated her like gold.

* * *

My emotions are broiling when I get behind the wheel of my old pickup truck. Three years later, and Wendy still has the ability to twist the knife—reminding me that, even after seeing her every single day for three hundred and eighty-six days—I never realized her shitty-ass version of teen love came with a condition, and that condition was looks. Everything I did for her was forgotten in an instant once I wasn’t good looking enough for her anymore.

I’d never pinned her for the shallow type. I was wrong. Just like I was wrong about a lot of things and a lot of people. I was served a crash course in reality after I was pushed into that fire, and it still eats at me like acid because this isn’t supposed to be my life and I don’t know how the hell to change it.

I shouldn’t be driving, drunk and underage with a bag of drugs in my pants, but I drive home in a rage anyway, not giving two fucks if I get pulled over and thrown in jail.

By the time I get home, it’s after 2:00 a.m., and my father is in the dark living room, dozing on the couch with a horror movie playing on the television. My parents always go to bed together, so I can only assume he stayed up to wait for me. I creep by him on my way to my room, but I trip over a dog toy in the middle of the floor and then bang into the coffee table, which I could’ve sworn was two feet to the right.

“Shit,” I mutter, rubbing my shin.

My father stirs and sits up, squinting in my direction against the glare of the television. “Ty? That you?”

“Go to bed,” I reply, swaying.

Instead, he stands and flicks on the lamp next to the couch, narrowing his eyes at me.

“You look like shit.”

“Thanks, Pop.”

“I can smell the alcohol on you from here. You been drinking again?”

Obviously. I lean against the wall to keep from falling on my ass. “Don’t start, okay? I’ve had enough shit for one day.”

He steps closer and grabs my shoulder, pulling me off the wall. His six-foot-four muscular frame looms over me. My father was a bad ass back in the day, and he’s still tough enough to kick my ass if he wanted to.

“Stand up like a man, Tyler,” he says. “You drove home like this?”

My vision blurs, and I see two of him in front of me. “Yeah…”

“You tryin’ to get killed? Or kill someone else?”

I blow out a breath and shove my hand through my long tangled hair. All I want to do is lie down before the nausea rippling through me makes a messy appearance. “No…just blowin’ off some steam.”

He rubs his forehead in frustration. “This shit is gonna stop. Today. Your mother and I aren’t going to sit back and watch you throw your life away—”

“What life, Pop?” I scoff. “What fucking life do I have?”

“Any life you want.”

“Like this? Looking like this?”

“Scars don’t define you, Tyler. What you do—and how you treat others—does. You’re hurting. You’re mad at the world. I get it. More than you know.” A hint of sadness and regret deepens his tone. “But people live with far worse problems than what you’re dealing with. Stop letting this ruin you. You’re better than this.”

No one seems able to grasp that, to me, I am ruined. Broken and wrecked and wandering around lost without a compass. “Well, sorry I’m such a big disappointment to you. Thank God you got five other kids to be proud of.”

His eyes soften, my words hitting him like a punch. “That never even crossed my mind. I’ve always been proud of you. You’ve always been special. But you need some help getting out of this fucking hole you’re in. You think I’m just going to let you get drunk and high every day?”

“I’m nineteen. I can do whatever the hell I want.”

“Not under my roof you won’t. And not in my business. This bullshit of coming to the shop stoned every day is gonna stop, too. It’s time to grow up. I want you in rehab tomorrow.”

No way am I going to rehab to sit around with a bunch of drunks and addicts sharing my feelings and listening to theirs. I’m not like them at all, and I’d rather gouge out my own eyes and ears than put myself through that.

“Fuck that.” I push past him, but then I turn back. “And ya know what? Fuck all this. I’m outta here.” I fish my keys out of my pocket. “I’ll just get out of your house and your shop for good.”

His shoulders drop as he sighs. “Tyler…just go upstairs and sleep it off. We’ll go together tomorrow. In a few weeks, you’ll be clean with a much better outlook on your life. Trust me.”

An obnoxious laugh erupts from me. “I seriously doubt that.”

Ignoring him as he continues to talk to my back, pleading with me not to leave, I stumble out of the house and jump on my bike, with him chasing after me in his bare feet. I glance back to see him stop halfway down the driveway—waving his hands at me, probably cursing me out—as I tear down the street.

Music blasting from my earphones quells my mood slightly as I ride up to the mountains, the only place I feel at peace, away from everyone. My bike tears up the dark, twisty mountain road, heading to a lookout point where I can pull over, roll a joint, and stare at the stars until this never-ending pain deep in my chest subsides. Tomorrow I’ll figure out what the hell I’m going to do next, but I definitely won’t be going to rehab or facing my parents. The last thing I need is more hospitals, doctors, and counselors telling me I’m going to be okay. None of them understand how not okay I really am.

And probably never will be.

It’s pitch black when I pull over to the remote dirt area that overlooks the towns below, but the glow of my cell phone gives me just enough light to find the old fallen tree I sit on every time I come up here. I watch the tiny car lights in the distance as I smoke the joint I just rolled, my only company the occasional breeze and an owl hooting off in the distance. Despite my peaceful surroundings, Wendy’s words continue to echo in my ears.

It skeeves me out.

Yeah, she was probably a bit drunk, and obviously in the midst of a fight, but she meant what she said. There’s a lot of truth in the words of angry people. There was a time when I thought I loved her, but I felt nothing but pity and disgust when I saw the bruises on her face. If I had ever really, truly loved her, it would have enraged me. I would have hunted that douchebag down and beaten him to a pulp, even if she wasn’t mine anymore. Maybe we never really did love each other. I reach into my pants, pull out the bag of drugs, and swallow two pills dry. I wait for the bitter pills to drag slowly down to my stomach before I grab my cell phone and press the speed dial for my oldest brother, who picks up on the fourth ring

“Yeah?” his deep, groggy voice bellows from the tiny phone speaker.

“Tor…it’s me.” I clear my throat of the burn. “Can I stay at your place for a while?”

“Ty? What the fuck? Do you know what time it is?”

“Around four…maybe. I think. Not sure.”

“Are you drunk?”

“Sorta. Among other things.” Hey, at least I’m an honest junkie.

His exasperated sigh travels through the phone. “Where are you?”

“Up at the lookout smokin’ a few.”

“Tell me you didn’t drive up there.”

“Nope.” I exhale smoke and watch it drift away into the dark. “I took the bike.”

“Seriously, Ty?” His voice grows louder as anger wakes him. “What the hell is wrong with you? Are you out of your fucked-up mind?”

“Skip the lecture, I’ve had enough for one night. Can I just stay at your place for a few days? I’m going through a rough time…”

The sound of sheets rustling sifts through the background. “No. I’m going back to bed. And I’m going to wring your neck next time I see you.”

Click.

“Asshole.” Standing, I snuff out the joint and put the roach in my pocket for later. He could have easily said yes, especially since his band is going on tour and his house is going to be empty. What’s the big deal if I stay there? He can fuck off too, along with everyone else.

I start up my bike and ride into the brisk mountain air. It’s just me, the road, and nature, and maybe that’s the way it’s supposed to be. My body relaxes, my mind eases, and I sink into the numbing, welcoming haze.

It was dark, and there was light.

Flashing, burning.

There was warmth, and there was ice.

Melting, oozing.

I was flying, but I had no wings.

Floating, drifting.

Until there was nothing at all.

And the silence screamed the loudest, crying to be heard.

* * *

“Tyler?” My brother’s voice booms through the fog. “Just nod if you can hear me. Stop trying to move.”

Tor is singing Pink Floyd songs. Why?

I nod, not wanting him to sense my confusion. The familiar sterile, bleachy smell and the faint beeping in the background bring me to the slow realization that I’m back in a hospital.

“I convinced your doctor to let me tell you what’s going on, but he’s right outside the door and he’s going to come in after I leave. Are you okay with that?”

I nod again, niggling fear mounting when I realize I can’t move or talk. And my brother is acting weird, talking to me almost like I’m a child.

“You’re going to hate me for a while, Ty. And that’s okay, because I hate you right now too, because I need you, and you’re a mess. I’m gonna make this short and sweet because I can’t be in six places at once.” He coughs into his hand. “You crashed your motorcycle into someone’s house. You went right through their living room wall of floor-to-ceiling windows.”

Fuck.

“No surprise—the doctors found alcohol and drugs in your system, and in your pocket, so I’m having a hard time feeling sorry for you right now.” He slowly shakes his head back and forth, disappointment emanating from him. “I love you, bro, but you did this to yourself. You can only dance with the devil for so long.”

I nod, the weight in my chest growing heavier, like a rhinoceros sitting on me.

“You’re pretty shredded up from the glass. To put it mildly? Your scars now have scars. Everywhere. You’ve got a few broken bones, but you’re lucky to be fucking alive, and you’re damn lucky those people were in bed, or you probably would have killed them while they were sitting in their living room watching TV.”

He avoids my eyes as I stare up at him from the hospital bed, silently begging him to just stop talking. I can’t hear any more of this or bear any more of the suffocating pressure in my chest.

His eyes finally sink into mine, and they’re darker than I’ve ever seen, like something has sucked the color and life from him. “I want you to listen to me, Ty, because I’m not going to have the strength to repeat this. You got that?”

I blink and nod, an icy chill scattering through my veins.

“A shard of glass pierced your neck and, by some miracle, didn’t hit your jugular, but it did damage part of your vocal chords. The doctor said it went in at just the perfect angle.” He steps away and stares out the window, watching the rain fall outside. “You’re going to need surgery, and you’re not going to be able to talk for a while, if ever. I’ll let the doctor explain after I leave. It’s probably best if you don’t try to speak.”

My heart pounds harder, a deep bass of fear and remorse, and when he turns back around, I’m sure the devastation on his face mirrors my own.

I can’t talk. I might never speak again.

There’s even more scars. Scars that will never heal.

You skeeve me out.

I could have killed someone.

I wish I had killed myself.

“I know you’re scared…but there’s more.” He takes a shaky breath before continuing. “Pop’s gone.” My brother’s baritone voice cracks and wavers. “He had a heart attack last night, and he died before they could get him to the hospital.”

I stop breathing. Everything around me stills. The sounds and smells tunnel backward. I silently will this moment to stop, to change, to not ever exist. I refuse to breathe, because I don’t want to move to the next moment: a time where my father no longer lives.

Tor covers his face with his hands for a moment and then slowly drops them. “I wish I could stay with you, but I can’t. Mom’s not dealing well with all this…none of them are…and I need to go make the arrangements.” He rocks on his heels, his hands stuffed into his front pockets, as he stares down at me, his exhausted, bloodshot eyes staying on mine, watching me absorb the worst news of my life. “I don’t have it in me to make this better for you, Ty, and I hope someday you can forgive me for that. If it’s any consolation to you, my life is ruined now, too. I can’t leave Mom and the rest of you alone. I can kiss the tour goodbye.”

I blink, and a tear slips down my scarred cheek. Silent sobs wrack my body long after he’s left me alone in the cold hospital room. I cry for my father, who I’ll never get to make things right with or apologize to. I cry for my mother, who lost her best friend and the love of her life. I cry for my brothers and my sister for losing an amazing father. I cry for Tor, for coming so close to his dreams, only to have them ripped away.

The faint voice that’s been whispering to me for the past three years, telling me how ugly I am and what a mess I am, finally finds its voice and screams through my soul.

This is all your fault.

I’ve never been a man afraid to cry, but right now I’m afraid I’m never going to stop.